


what we have in ours

by seeingrightly



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti)
Genre: Alcohol, M/M, Post-Canon, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-29
Updated: 2020-03-29
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:55:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,823
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23368048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seeingrightly/pseuds/seeingrightly
Summary: Richie ends up regretting a lot of his big ideas. Usually it’s straightforward regret, but sometimes it’s complicated. Like when Eddie walks into Bev and Ben’s engagement party. They’re on the roof of the happy couple’s apartment building - there’s a garden, a pool, a makeshift bar, and tons of people Richie doesn’t know all dressed in the requested “beach chic” attire, or some approximation of it. Richie, for example, is in a pretty standard outfit for him, but with nicer shoes and his hair a little less messy than usual.Eddie, hovering near the doorway onto the roof, is in pressed white chino shorts, boat shoes, a black tank top, and over that an unbuttoned red, white, and black Hawaiian shirt. Richie’s shirt. He must have ironed it. Probably washed it, too. It’s crisper and whiter than it’s ever been. It’s also several sizes too big and hangs loose on his frame. He should look like a little kid in a costume, but he doesn’t. He looks really good.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 8
Kudos: 86





	what we have in ours

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tozierrichie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tozierrichie/gifts).



> this is for gillian, who prompted nose touching, sharing clothes/personal items, and taking pictures together. i hope u enjoy it!!
> 
> title is from "sweetener" by ariana grande

Richie ends up regretting a lot of his big ideas. Usually it’s straightforward regret, but sometimes it’s complicated. Like when Eddie walks into Bev and Ben’s engagement party. They’re on the roof of the happy couple’s apartment building - there’s a garden, a pool, a makeshift bar, and tons of people Richie doesn’t know all dressed in the requested “beach chic” attire, or some approximation of it. Richie, for example, is in a pretty standard outfit for him, but with nicer shoes and his hair a little less messy than usual.

Eddie, hovering near the doorway onto the roof, is in pressed white chino shorts, boat shoes, a black tank top, and over that an unbuttoned red, white, and black Hawaiian shirt. Richie’s shirt. He must have ironed it. Probably washed it, too. It’s crisper and whiter than it’s ever been. It’s also several sizes too big and hangs loose on his frame. He should look like a little kid in a costume, but he doesn’t. He looks really good.

Richie hates himself. It was a genius idea. And now he’s going to suffer for it. No point delaying the inevitable, though, when none of his other friends are here yet except, of course, Ben and Bev, who are a little busy being fawned over.

“Hey,” Richie calls over the music and chatter, waving his beer til Eddie spots him.

“Oh, hey,” Eddie calls back, then two women holding hands and laughing cross in front of him before he can move closer.

Richie drains most of the rest of his beer in one ill-advised swallow and then points to the bar. Eddie nods, and after a minute, they’re waiting in the short line together.

“Hey,” Eddie says again, sounding a little self-conscious.

He looks Richie up and down quickly, and Richie waits for a comment, but there isn’t one. He elbows Eddie, then finishes off his beer and tosses it into a nearby recycling can. When he comes back, he elbows Eddie again for good measure. He’s tipsy. This is what happens.

“What?” Eddie asks too loudly, glaring when the guy in front of them looks over his shoulder.

“Nothing,” Richie says, and Eddie kicks him lightly in the shin.

“You’re twelve years old,” Eddie says. “And you still dress like you’re twelve.”

“There it is,” Richie says fondly, but hopefully not too fondly. “Hey, if I had one of my shirts from back then it’d probably fit you better -”

“There it is,” Eddie repeats, his tone entirely different from Richie’s. “You know what, I could just take this off -”

“No!” Richie yells, too loudly too quickly, putting his hands on Eddie’s shoulders when he moves like he’s going to take the shirt off.

It’s probably half panic at the thought of seeing Eddie’s bare arms and shoulder, and half despair at only getting to see him in his shirt for such a short amount of time. None of it is appropriate or normal, so Richie drops his hands quickly, and takes a step back for good measure, laughing awkwardly.

“No, man, come on,” he says. “You just got here. You gotta adhere to the theme. It’s fine!”

“It is not fine. I look ridiculous,” Eddie grumbles, coming close to pouting, which melts Richie back open.

“You don’t look ridiculous,” he says. “Hey, you know what you could try?”

He reaches toward Eddie, who looks suspicious but doesn’t move away, and he grabs the bottom of the shirt. Then he ties it into a knot at Eddie’s waist.

“There,” he says, spreading his hands and grinning.

“I hate you,” Eddie says, but he doesn’t untie it. “Was this your plan the whole time? To make me look like an idiot? I should have known -”

“No, no, no, come on, Eds,” Richie says genuinely. “Of course not. And you don’t look like an idiot.”

Eddie squints up at him.

“Fine,” he says, finally untying his shirt as they get to the bar.

“Aw,” the bartender says, wrinkling her nose. “You should keep it tied and take off your tank top.”

Richie laughs hard enough that his face turns red. That’s the only reason. Because the mental image is funny. Eddie has no reason to think his face is red for any other reason. When he gets his next beer, Richie takes a long pull and then burps loudly when he comes up for air.

“Ugh,” Eddie says, shoving him.

Bill and Mike show up then, which is nice, because Richie needs a little room to breathe maybe, actually, and he’s not planning to get hammered at his friends’ nice party full of fancy people, but he might end up that way if it was just him and Eddie and Eddie’s narrow shoulders swimming in Richie’s shirt.

Here’s the thing, though - he ends up well on his way to hammered anyway. They pick a corner of the roof and sit down together and yell and laugh and Ben and Bev float in and out delivering more drinks and maybe ignoring the rest of their friends more than they should, and it’s fucking great. Bev sits on the arm of Richie’s chair and kisses the top of his head and hands him a shot. Bill sprawls across Richie’s lap with tears of laughter streaming down his face. Ben wraps his arms around Eddie’s waist and picks him up and pretends to throw him in the pool, only to trip and almost do it for real. Mike keeps grabbing everyone’s hands and telling them he loves them. It’s the best.

Bev gasps and throws her arms out in front of her, startling Eddie so hard he falls over into Richie’s side.

“Pictures!” she hollers. “We have to take pictures. Everyone get up!”

She slaps Ben and Mike, on either side of her, on their thighs and then pushes up to stand, her expression triumphant. She goes and wrangles someone into taking her phone, and then she snatches Mike’s phone right out of his hands and gives it to someone else, and she does that til all their phones have been given away, Eddie complaining loudly after his is grabbed.

“Come on, Spaghetti,” Richie says, throwing an arm over his shoulders and squishing him up against Mike.

“Okay,” Ben says loudly like he can sense what’s going on from the other end of the group. “Let’s do a couple of nice ones first.”

“Yes, Dad,” Richie calls, and Ben reaches down the line to bop him on the back of the head with one of his elastic arms.

Eddie snickers, tucked into Richie’s side, so it’s worth it. It’s distracting, and Richie can’t guess what face he’s making in the first few pictures, before Bev says it’s time for silly ones. They lift Bev up, first, laying across their arms. Eddie makes sure her dress is covering her up.

“I’ve got a bathing suit on underneath, it’s fine,” Bev laughs, grabbing Eddie’s hand and keeping it while they take the next few pictures.

“Now what?” Bill asks when they put her down.

“Whatever you want,” Bev says, coming up behind Richie and wrapping her arms around his middle.

“Aw, this is nice,” he says as they sway back and forth a little. “You want in, Eds?”

Eddie makes a face, but then Bill wraps his arms around Eddie’s shoulders and pushes him toward Richie, and then Mike crowds in behind Bev and Ben somehow comes up behind Bill and gets his hands on Richie’s sides. One moment Eddie is half a foot away and the next they’re being squished together, Eddie’s nose touching Richie’s throat.

“Are you suffocating?” Richie asks, half meaning it, but his arms are trapped at his sides.

“No,” Eddie says against his throat, and Richie’s whole body shivers.

There’s nothing to be done about it. It happens, and everyone probably feels it in some part of his body. There’s a pause, and then Bev cackles, squeezing Richie, and Mike shushes her. Eddie pulls back to look at Richie, but he can’t go very far. Richie looks out toward the people taking their pictures, wondering what his face looks like in the ones they’re taking now. They know; they all must know. Everyone at this party is staring at him, everyone in the world, they all know how he feels about Eddie. Eddie knows. And Richie might die waiting for a reaction.

“Hey, look at me,” Eddie says.

Richie doesn’t want to. But maybe it would be better to get it over with.

“Rich,” Eddie says.

He turns to fully look at Eddie, and their noses almost touch. And then they do touch. Eddie leans up into it. Richie can’t really read his expression from this close, but somehow, Eddie moves his arm through the mass of limbs surrounding them, and he grabs Richie’s hand.

Richie breathes out a breath he didn’t realize he was holding, which is weird because Eddie’s face is right there. But Eddie smiles; Richie can feel his face move when he does, and Richie can breathe again.

“That’s your hand, right?” Richie asks. “It’d be kinda weird if it was Bill.”

“Hey!” Bill says, and Ben lets go of Richie to bop Bill on the head.

“It’s me,” Eddie says, quieter, another chill runs through Richie.

“Cool,” Richie says, and Bev cackles again. “I hate all of you except for Eddie.”

“We know,” says at least three other people, including Eddie.

“I’m leaving,” Richie says, except when he tries to, everyone squeezes tighter and he can’t move at all.

He laughs. He lets out a big, body-shaking laugh, leaning his weight on his friends, on his favorite people in the whole world. He feels like he’s having an out of body experience, maybe. Nothing is resolved, here - he doesn’t know what’s going to happen with Eddie, exactly - but he feels safe. He feels loved. They know, and they want to hold onto him forever.

Maybe, for once, when Richie sees the pictures, he’ll like what things look like from the outside. For the first time, the outside and the inside will match. For the first time, saying any of it out loud doesn’t make him feel like he’s going to fall apart, because his friends are holding him together.

Eddie’s hand squeezes his as Richie starts to calm down, and Richie squeezes back.

“Hey,” Richie says, feeling maybe the best he ever has, “when these bozos stop squashing us, you wanna go somewhere and talk?”

Bev fully screams in Richie’s ear, and everyone else steps back from them immediately. Eddie, no longer pressed against Richie’s front but still holding his hand, smiles up at him from a much more visible distance.

“You’re a bozo too,” he says. “But yeah. Let’s go.”

As they walk off to find a different corner of the party, one of their friends wolf whistles and the rest cheer and clap and yell. And Richie just laughs.

**Author's Note:**

> find me on twitter at [coralbluenmbr5](https://twitter.com/coralbluenmbr5)


End file.
